Racing News: Toyota Prepares for a "Must-Win" Formula One Season

NEARLY GONE: Toyota officials acknowledged that slumping car sales nearly led to the company pulling its Formula One racing program. Tadashi Yamashina, chairman of Toyota Motor Sports, said the pressure is on and for the team to survive it “must win” this season.

A SAD DAY: Fans and racers alike are morning the loss of one of America’s historic short tracks. Manzanita Speedway, located in Phoenix, was sold March 12 and will be used for industrial development. The final race at the half-mile oval, which has been holding auto races for 58 years, will be April 11.

FUEL CONSIDERATIONS: As the Indy Racing League considers a new engine formula that would be used beginning in 2012, one thing holding up the process is the fuel to be used. While the IndyCar Series currently uses ethanol, several of the manufacturers interested in supplying engines would prefer to use a gasoline/ethanol blend. No decision has been made either way at this point in the process.

BUD RUNS DRY: Currently in its 30th season of sponsoring Kenny Bernstein Racing, Anheuser-Busch informed the legendary NHRA drag racer that its Budweiser brand will not return to sponsor the team with Kenny’s son Brandon driving in 2010, ending the longest sponsorship relationship in motorsports history.

HIRED: Joe Mattes has been named interim president of Motorsports Authentics.

TOP DOG: With Donny Schatz struggling during a two-day World of Outlaws visit to Silver Dollar Speedway, Kyle Busch moved to the top of the National Speed Sport News Power Rankings. The rankings appear weekly in America’s Motorsports Authority.

SUBSCRIBE: National Speed Sport News has been published weekly since 1934. To subscribe to National Speed Sport News, click here for a special industry rate.

Racing News: Ken Anderson and Peter Windsor Form American F1 Team

SEMA eNews, Vol. 12, No. 8 - Feb 26, 2009
Racing News: Ken Anderson and Peter Windsor Form American F1 Team

FORMULA ONE: A new U.S.-based Formula One team based in Charlotte, North Carolina, was unveiled Tuesday. Ken Anderson and Peter Windsor are the team principals.

DATE MOVES: With promoter Joe Mattioli III no longer involved at Nashville’s Music City Motorplex, the ARCA RE/MAX Series race scheduled there has been moved to Mansfield Motorsports Park, which had announced in December it would not open for the 2009 season. Mattioli worked an arrangement with Mansfield owner Mike Dzurilla to have the race at Mansfield on June 20.

CLOSING: Pennsylvania’s Jennerstown Speedway, near Pittsburgh, is closing for 2009 and is for sale.

NEW PROMOTER: Milwaukee Mile Holdings LLC, headed by Claude Napier, has been named the new promoter at The Milwaukee Mile, located on the grounds of the Wisconsin State Fairgrounds.

SOLD: Tri-City Speedway in Franklin, Pennsylvania, has been sold to Rick Hetrick and Roy Hill, who will operate the dirt-track facility this season.

HIRED: Robert Doornbos has been hired to drive the second Newman/Haas/Lanigan Indy car alongside Graham Rahal. Milka Duno is expected to test with the team and could wheel a third car for the organization this season.

OPEN WHEELERS: USAC opened the season with the Copper on Dirt at Manzanita Speedway. Darren Hagen (sprint cars), Brad Sweet (midgets) and Bud Kaeding (Silver Crown) were winners.

ANOTHER HONOR: National Speed Sport News Editor Chris Economaki has been named the 2009 winner of the Pocono Raceway Bill France Award of Excellence.

TOP DOG: With his second-consecutive NASCAR Sprint Cup Series victory, Matt Kenseth jumped to the top of the weekly National Speed Sport News Power Rankings. The rankings appear weekly in America’s motorsports authority.

SUBSCRIBE: National Speed Sport News has been published weekly since 1934. To subscribe to National Speed Sport News, click on the following link for a special industry rate: www.nationalspeedsportnews.com/subscribe.html?pid=NQ%2BVfhkepT4%3D.

PENSKE RACING TO FIELD THIRD PORSCHE ALMS TEAM WITH BRISCOE, CASTRONEVES

EXTRA PORSCHE: Penske Racing will field a third Porsche entry in the American Le Mans Series Petit Le Mans event at Road Atlanta in early October with Indy car drivers Ryan Briscoe and Helio Castroneves sharing the wheel.

HIRED GUNS PART II: Andretti Green Racing Indy car drivers Marco Andretti and Tony Kanaan will join Frank Montagny in the team’s Acura during the Petit Le Mans at Road Atlanta.

A WINNER: Valentino Rossi won the weather-plagued MotoGP debut at Indianapolis Motor Speedway Sunday.

NEW TEAM: UPS officially announced that it would join Roush Fenway Racing next season and sponsor the No. 6 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series car driven by David Ragan.

STAYING PUT: Ferrari has signed Formula One drivers Felipe Massa and Kimi Raikkonen to contracts, which will keep them with the team through the 2010 season.

POWER RANKINGS: NHRA Top Fuel point leader Tony Schumacher remained at the top of the National Speed Sport News Power Rankings after his seventh-consecutive victory Sunday at the inaugural event at zMAX Dragway in Concord, North Carolina. The triumph was the 53rd of his career, breaking his tie with Joe Amato as the winningest Top Fuel driver in history. The National Speed Sport News Power Rankings are published weekly in the 74-year-old motorsports publication.

SUBSCRIBE: National Speed Sport News has been published weekly since 1934. To subscribe to National Speed Sport News, click on the following link for a special industry rate: www.nationalspeedsportnews.com/subscribe.html?pid=NQ%2BVfhkepT4%3D.

TORONTO GRAND PRIX RETURNS AS INDYCAR EVENT AND OTHER RACING NEWS

NEW PROMOTER: Andretti Green Promotions has purchased the assets of the former Grand Prix Association of Toronto and will present the popular Canadian race as an IndyCar Series event next season.

DEBUT: Toyota’s new USAC Silver Crown engine will debut in Friday night’s Hoosier Hundred at the Indiana State Fairgrounds. It will run in the 6-R Racing entry piloted by Brian Tyler.

AWARD WINNER: Bishop Steering Technology received the annual BorgWarner Louis Schwitzer Award at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

DRAGS: Melanie Troxel became the second female to win an NHRA Funny Car event and one of 14 drivers to have won a national event in both Top Fuel and Funny Car. Meanwhile, Dave Connolly collected Chevrolet’s 150th NHRA Pro Stock triumph.

NO. 60: The Little 500 sprint-car race, a 500-lap event on a quarter-mile track at Anderson Speedway in Indiana, celebrates its 60th running on Saturday night.

POWER RANKINGS: NASCAR driver Kyle Busch remained at the top of the National Speed Sport News Power Rankings. The National Speed Sport News Power Rankings are published weekly in the 74-year-old motorsports publication.

SUBSCRIBE: National Speed Sport News has been published weekly since 1934. To subscribe to National Speed Sport News, click on the following link for a special industry rate: www.nationalspeedsportnews.com/subscribe.html?pid=NQ%2BVfhkepT4%3D.

SEMA Racing News

SEMA eNews, Vol. 11, No. 19 - May 08, 2008
ROOKIE PRACTICE LAPS OPEN THE INDY 500 AND OTHER RACING NEWS

A BIG NIGHT: Tony Stewart Racing was the big winner Saturday night. The team owned by two-time NASCAR champion Tony Stewart saw its newest driver, Donny Schatz, win the World of Outlaws race at Knoxville (Iowa) Raceway, while Levi Jones wheeled Stewart’s USAC sprint car to victory in USAC’s first-ever race at Brownstown (Indiana) Speedway. Also at Brownstown, Ronnie Combs won the UMRA three-quarter-midget race in a car owned by Stewart, while Steve Barnett drove the Indiana veteran’s crate late-model to victory at Brownstown as well.

THE NEW AND THE OLD: Seventeen-year-old Joey Logano turned in a dominant performance to win the Carolina 500 ARCA RE/MAX Series which reopened Rockingham (North Carolina) Speedway after four years.

SIGNED: NASCAR Sprint Cup Series driver Carl Edwards signed a three-year contract extension to remain with Roush Fenway Racing.

ON THE POWER: Former Champ Car driver Will Power was quickest on Opening Day at Indianapolis Motor Speedway, but Alex Lloyd jumped to the top of the speed charts on the second day of rookie practice. The veterans were set to hit the track for the first time on May 6 in anticipation of Pole Day on Saturday.

RELEASED: Veteran IndyCar crew member Larry Curry was released as team manager of Vision Racing. He was replaced by Keven Kukuliwicz, who has been with the team for many years.

1,000: Fifteen-time NHRA Funny Car champion John Force earned his 1,000th round victory during Sunday’s NHRA POWERade Drag Racing Series event at Gateway (Illinois) International Raceway. However, Force lost in the second round and Tim Wilkerson won the event.

RENOVATIONS: Martinsville (Virginia) Speedway will undergo more than $2 million worth of renovations, including the installation of a state-of-the-art scoreboard prior to the October 19 NASCAR Sprint Cup event at the .526-mile oval.

POWER RANKINGS: With a pair of top-five finishes in two NASCAR races, Kyle Busch remained at the top of the National Speed Sport News Power Rankings. The National Speed Sport News Power Rankings, which are published weekly in the 74-year-old motorsports publication.

SUBSCRIBE: National Speed Sport News has been published weekly since 1934. To subscribe to National Speed Sport News, click on the following link for a special industry rate: www.nationalspeedsportnews.com/subscribe.html?pid=NQ%2BVfhkepT4%3D.

Genreal Racing News Shorts

STILL THE SAME: Testing for the Rolex 24 at Daytona got under way in earnest, but the Chip Ganassi Racing entry of defending race winners Scott Pruett and Juan Montoya was again at the top of the speed charts. The pair will share driving duties with Dario Franchitti and Memo Rojas.

COMPROMISE: American Le Mans Series officials will add 25 kilograms to its LMP2 sports cars in an effort to keep them from overpowering the LMP1 Audis. The change is in violation of the rules leased to the series by the governing body of the 24 Hours of Le Mans, the Automobile Club du L’Ouest.

Yokohama Tire Corporation promoted Dan Guiney to director of technical services. According Jim MacMaster, Yokohama executive vice president, business division, Guiney, "is a consummate professional. Dan's engineering expertise will be used in several areas to assist Yokohama, including more involvement in tire testing; quality control and audits; consumer affairs, OE testing; and aftermarket service. Plus, Dan is Yokohama's technical representative to the Rubber Manufacturers Association."



Source: Sema News

More SEMA Photos

SEMA Photos

2007 INDY CAR CHAMPION DARIO FRANCHITTI MOVING TO NASCAR

SEMA eNews, Vol. 10, No. 37 - Sep 13, 2007
2007 INDY CAR CHAMPION DARIO FRANCHITTI MOVING TO NASCAR AND OTHER RACING NEWS

HEAD WEST: The Champ Car World Series has announced a return to Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca next season. The event does not add a race to the schedule, as it will replace the San Jose Grand Prix, which has run in the streets of San Jose the past two years. A date for the race has not been announced.

CHAMP ON THE MOVE: Dario Franchitti secured the IndyCar Series championship last weekend at Chicagoland Speedway, but the Scottish driver is reportedly heading to NASCAR and will drive the No. 40 Dodge for Chip Ganassi Racing in the Sprint Cup Series next season.

AGREEMENT: AT&T, NASCAR and Sprint Nextel reached an agreement that will allow Richard Childress Racing to run AT&T logos on its car, but the deal is contingent on AT&T being out of the sport by the end of the 2009 season.

RETIRING: Noted NASCAR team owner Robert Yates will retire at the end of the season, handing the keys to his race team to his son Doug. David Gilliland and Travis Kvapil will wheel the Yates entries next season.

STICKING AROUND: Thanks to an offer from rival team owner Ken Black to fly him to 10 events next season, four-time NHRA champion Gary Scelzi has decided to nix plans to take a sabbatical from drag racing and will return to the Don Schumacher Racing Funny Car camp full time next season.

MAKES: Joe Gibbs Racing officially announced its switch from Chevrolet cars to the Toyota Camry for the 2008 NASCAR Nextel Cup and Busch Series campaigns.

SHORT TRACK ACES: Jimmy Owens won the prestigious World 100 dirt-late-model race at Eldora Speedway, while Joey Saldana picked up the victory in the Gold Cup Race of Champions winged-sprint-car race at Chico, California. Todd Shute was the big winner at the IMCA Super Nationals.

NUMBER ONE: Tony Schumacher remained at the top of the NSSN Power Rankings, but Indy Racing League champion Dario Franchitti jumped to second in the countdown.

Source : SEMA News